in san francisco, several boutique design consultancies are … · 2015-01-09 · gb&d 201...

gb&d 2014 Passive House Special Edition

16

Passive Pride

In San Francisco, several boutique design consultancies are advocating for the hard science behind Passive House. Fortunately, the Bay Area has had the cash—and cultural acceptance—to experiment. A tour of the best the Bay Area has to offer.

BY BRANDON SMITH

FeatureSan Francisco

2014 Passive House Special Edition gb&d

17


18

PHO

TO: M

AT

THEW

MIL

LMA

N

WWhen you’re old and frail, or maybe when your kids are old and frail, textbooks may refer back to the early 2000s as the time when we started applying the same rigor-ous science to the design of our built envi-ronment that for a hundred years already we had put to work in our cars, entertain-ment, and communication. Those future readers might wonder, “What took us so long?”

Nobody is doing more to advance build-ing science today than the people behind Passive House. They advocate super-tight envelopes, extreme insulation and spe-cialty windows, window placement that accounts for solar gain, and heat-exchanger ventilators and heat-recapturing applianc-es. They’re thoroughly mindful of thermal bridging—properly insulating I-beams from the outside, for example, since in the win-ter they suck heat out.

One of the Passive House movement’s most significant achievements is analytical software that ties together all these tech-niques and materials and provides predic-tive power based on real analyses of houses built before.

Based on how you interpret data from the Association of Bay Area Governments, Passive House construction stands some-where between 0.5 percent and 2.0 percent of total construction since the first Passive Houses were built in the Bay Area four years ago. But that number alone leaves the wrong impression. The designers, builders, and consultants behind those 30 projects have reimagined the way homes and other buildings can be constructed. They obsess over the numbers spat out by their mod-eling tools, not just because it’s so hard to meet the standards, but because the num-bers mean real dollars that families don’t put into fossil fuels each month.

And the data keeps getting more gran-ular. With proper construction, the body heat of an additional occupant or large pet can make a significant difference on the calculus. Luckily, with better data—pains-takingly gathered after every job is com-plete—comes the ability to design a more reliably comfortable and efficient space.

Practitioners generally say that meeting Passive House standards boosts the cost of a new building by 10 percent and lowers


Zero CottagePrudence Ferreira helped San Francis-co architect David Baker design this home-workshop hybrid, named for its status as a Net Zero Energy-certified project. The home features a variety of found and reclaimed materials, such as the salvaged metal façade.

Details Location San FranciscoSize 712 ft2 (living space), 430 ft2 (workshop)Completion 2012Certification Passive House (PHIUS), Net Zero Energy (ILFI), LEED PlatinumPassive House Consultant Prudence FerreiraArchitect David Baker ArchitectContractor Falcon Five Design BuildClient David Baker

Early Adopter Why the Bay Area is a Passive House Hub

Because much of the San Francisco population has higher-than-average incomes and real estate values didn’t plummet like in much of the rest of the country during the financial crisis, individuals maintained equity they could reinvest.

Higher-than-average education levels means there is likely more awareness of technological advancements in building science.

While progressive building codes had encouraged builder awareness already, PHIUS lobbied the San Francisco build-ing department—as the USGBC had previously done with LEED Gold and Plat-inum projects—to fast-track permitting of Passive House structures.

The Bay Area boasts a culture of early adoption, innovation, and environmentalism.

The temperate climate means Passive House standards are relatively easyto meet.


20

PHO

TOS:

MA

TTH

EW M

ILLM

AN


Top A ladder-like stair with staggered rungs connects the kitchen and dining area to the third-floor living space.

Bottom Left On the cottage’s roof are reclaimed tires that serve as planters for drought-tolerant succulents. Can-tilevered over the courtyard is a solar array that provides all of the structure’s energy needs.

Bottom Right The first floor of the building is Baker’s workshop, which serves as a small production facility.

2014 Passive House Special Edition gb&d

21

energy cost by about 90 percent. Because more extreme climates require more ener-gy, return on investment is quicker in less temperate places. Passive House software can tell builders and developers exactly how quick the ROI is. More significantly, owners save on big-ticket maintenance since, as contractors will tell you, these buildings are built to last. Today’s average homebuilder may not be building for ob-solescence but also isn’t building for lon-gevity. Passive House standards, in contrast, generally keep up with the latest research on why structures tend to fail.

According to research led by Building Science Corporation founder Joe Lsti-burek, buildings usually crumble from condensation in the walls due to air leak-age through cracks and holes—not vapor diffusion through unmarred wall material.

Passive House puts energy conservation first. Graham Irwin, principal of Essen-tial Habitat, a Bay Area design consultan-cy, can tell a client exactly what effects a personal preference has on efficiency, and software programs such as WUFI and PHPP help economize the process. The game has become all about the numbers.

“[Passive House] makes the science ac-cessible and useful in the design and con-

struction process in a way that it hadn’t been before,” says Irwin, whose portfolio of about a dozen Passive House-certified projects is arguably the largest in the area. “The general concepts were there, but it was light on execution—soft, nebulous. For example, yes, insulation is good, but is more always better? The answer is yes, but there are declining returns. It’s important to know where those diminishing returns are.” For example, 24 inches of insulation won’t do a homeowner much good if his or her windows are sub-par.

Windows play an important role in Pas-sive House certification. Until recently, Pas-sive Houses in the United States typically have used German-built windows because they were the only reliable systems avail-able. But according to Prudence Ferreira, who worked with Irwin before founding In-tegral Impact, some of the window-mak-ers’ installation manuals were written only in German, and the companies offered no customer support. Ferreira has been help-ing to convince American window compa-nies to make products to their standards ever since. Marvin Windows, she says, picked up the idea first, but they don’t offer a total solution. “We need to get manufac-turers to step up,” Ferreira says, “because this is unsustainable.”

O’Neill ResidenceThis Sonoma house was the first Passive House in California and the first certified Passive House retrofit in the country. Despite numerous challeng-es, including two uninsulated slabs and an irregular con-figuration, the home is now a model of energy efficiency.

DetailsLocation SonomaSize 2,380 ft2 Completion 2010Certification Passive House (PHIUS)Passive House Consultant Essential HabitatArchitect Lail Design GroupLandscape Architect Chandler & ChandlerContractor PassivWorksClient Cathy O’Neill


22

PHO

TOS:

ED

WA

RD C

ALD

WEL

L; O

PEN

HO

ME

PHO

TOG

RAPH

Y (E

QU

ILIB

RIU

M)

Awareness and knowledge of how to build to reach Passive House certification seems to be, as they say, trickling down, while the projects themselves are scaling up. Currently under construction in the Bay Area are three multifamily projects, which, in addition to requiring more en-ergy than single-family homes and thus having more potential for energy savings, allow one well-sealed envelope to serve a number of occupants. According to Dan Johnson, who owns his own Bay Area consultancy, Design and Energy, one planner for a European-style apartment complex reportedly removed more than twenty furnaces from his building design, successfully replacing them with just one of similar size.

But one thing is for sure: research and development has been expensive. It has taken cash-flush owners and architects, in-cluding many from the Bay Area, to prove that Passive House can work in the United States. Now that many building profession-

als know what they’re doing, however, ad-vocates are hoping that they can ignite an American efficiency revolution.

PHIUS (Passive House Institute US) and Passive House California are two groups pushing for the same thing who don’t always agree on how it should be done. One recent debate between the two orga-nizations hinges on whether to relax the maximum energy-per-square-foot rule, spe-cifically for heating. It’s a tough balance to strike. Johnson says a new generation is coming into leadership, and he tends to think this new crop of leaders is truly trying to unify things. “I guess it’s a testa-ment to how powerful these ideas are that people would be so passionate about them to disagree,” he says.

“It’s kind of the difference between what refrigerator brand you pick,” Ferreira says. “No matter what certification you use, you’re still going to have a super-high-per-formance structure. It’s kind of like split-


Equilibrium HouseThis renovated four-bedroom home was one of the first Passive Houses to go on the market in San Francisco. It sold for more than the asking price.

DetailsLocation San FranciscoSize 3,317 ft2 (interior), 4,200 ft2 (exterior)Completion 2013Certification PHIUS+ Certified, LEED for HomesPassive House Consultant Essential HabitatArchitect Hood Thomas ArchitectsContractor ENU Construction Client Equilibrium House

Thesen-KramerResidence This net-zero home in Palo Alto goes beyond LEED Plat-inum and Passive House standards, intelligently reusing site materials and prompting natural ventilation via oper-able skylights.

DetailsLocation Palo AltoSize 2,500 ft2

Completion 2011Certification LEED Platinum, Passive House (PHIUS)Passive House Consultant Dan JohnsonArchitect Arkin Tilt ArchitectsContractor Josh Moore, Red CompanyClient Thesen-Kramer family


24

ting hairs when you look at the bigger pic-ture.” Ferreira, a PHIUS board member, says the organization does want to bridge the gap. After all, PHIUS held this year’s annual conference in San Francisco, the flagship city of Passive House California. “That’s one of the great things about these confer-ences,” she says. “It is definitely a living, breathing community, and we want it to be democratic.”

What’s the future of Passive House? It may be government-prompted or even mandated adoption. Some Passive House builders have been watching Europe and

see writing on the wall; much of that con-tinent may move to a passive standard for its minimum building code in the com-ing decades. Meanwhile, PHIUS has been pushing for partnerships with huge govern-ment programs like Energy Star, which has been wildly successful at increasing public awareness. According to Ferreira, the US Department of Energy is considering the Passive House standard for inclusion in its Net Zero Energy-Ready Home pro-gram, which may “become the next Energy Star.” Only time will tell, but the science is sound. gb&d


Wood Residence With tilt-and-turn doors, the home of documentary filmmakers James and Jennifer Jandak Wood comprises a guest house and main residence (both certified). DetailsLocation SonomaSize 3,709 ft2 (main residence), 659 ft2

(guest house)Completion 2012Certification PHIUS+ Certified, US DOE Challenge HomePassive House Consultant Essential HabitatArchitect Signum ArchitectureLandscape Architect Roche & RocheContractor PassivWorksClient James and Jennifer Jandak-Wood

Too Passive a Pace?Top five issues preventing the growth of Passive House

➊ The appraisal and the mortgage-lend-ing industries. “You can’t ask for 15 percent more money because your Passive House costs 15 percent more than another one of similar square footage,” says consultant Prudence Ferreira. “Banks just don’t have a way or haven’t tried to gauge the value of the owner having more cash liquidity during the life of the loan” because of re-duced maintenance and energy costs. “There’s not enough recognition of what these buildings deliver.”

➋ Awareness among contractors, developers, and buyers and the culture of automatically building to minimum code. This could be solved by boosting the code or increasing awareness of Passive House’s affordability. “My experience in construction is that it’s made up of 90 percent laggards and one percent early adopters,” says Passive House consultant Dan Johnson. “It’s not a bell curve.”

➌ Learning to make retrofits econom-ically feasible in more climate zones. “I could take my utility bill down from thirty dollars to two dollars, but why bother?” Johnson says. “At the same time, with new construction, it’s like, ‘Why not?’

➍ Specialty materials and mechani-cal equipment, often imported from Europe, are not yet readily available. Some North Amer-ican companies are slowly scaling up production.

➎ Tax incentives for photovoltaics, although not bad, have diverted attention away from measures like passive technologies that save more ener-gy per initial dollar spent.

in san francisco, several boutique design consultancies are … · 2015-01-09 · gb&d 201...

Documents